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Its interesting these days that when an actor/actress is also a singer, you need to hole them into one category or the other. However, when I think of Julie Andrews, its both, and its a rare breed. Humbling in all aspects, Andrews is a classic “entertainer” in every sense of the word. Its interesting seeing her in films these days basically playing the “Olde English Matron” part like ‘The Princess Diaries’, but I’ll always remember her from ‘The Sound of Music.’ I do, however, remember being startled when I saw ‘S.O.B.’ (directed by her husband, Blake Edwards) and Ms. Andrews ripped off her top and said “I am going to show my boobies. Are you here to see my boobies?” I guess that’s what I call a “range of characters.”

But I digress…. Andy Williams (another classic singer who I’ll focus on in later posts) had a show that lasted from 1962-1967 which was kinda like those Bob Hope specials we used to watch as kids. You had some comedy sketches, some singing and some whatever else. Its a “Variety Show” for a reason.

I have a feeling you won’t see shows like this ever again now that Bob Hope is no longer with us. Sure, there may be the over-produced Christmas Special with (insert underwhelming entertainer here), but I can’t really see these coming back anytime soon. Stuff like this makes me want to pick up those DVD copies of ‘The Andy Williams Show’, ‘The Dean Martin Comedy Hour’ and of course, ‘This is Tom Jones.’

Now that we have the internet, MTV and our short attention/multi-tasking culture, variety shows like this where the talent is full and the activity is limited don’t have much of an audience as once the act repeats itself, you change the channel or skip the program on your Tivo. However, now that you have the internet, and great sites like YouTube, you can enjoy the special moments like this as they sing ‘The Language of Love’ for The Andy Williams Show.